Gold Coast (Australia) - Fowler's Hospitable Board

In 1879 the Divisional Boards Act created the Nerang Divisional Board, stretching from the Coomera river to Coolangata on the border. The first meeting was held at the Court House at Nerang on 19 February 1880. Burleigh Head and Tallebudgera were included within Division 3, a representative of which was Frederick Fowler - surely the founder of modern Burleigh Heads.

Fowler was a well-known timber-getter - hauler and grazier in the Tallebudgera district. He was born at Pennant Hills, 'Parramatta river, New South Wales', in 1842 the son of a cutter owner, Daniel Fowler and Bridgit (nee O'Hara). He had moved north to Queensland in 1863, joining the Veivers, the Boziers, the Cockerills and the Duncans in their timber-getting activities in the Nerang and Tallebudgera districts. He was amongst the first to acquire land in the Tallebudgera under the Selection Act of 1868 and in 1875 he had married Elizabeth Bozier, daughter of the timber-getter, William Bozier. His bullock team was famous in the seventies as it hauled the maize and cut timber along the road to Harper's Wharf.

His familiar call 'Come on, Nobby!' sounded along the road, one writer in 1882 recording -

It should be remarked that 'the Nobbies' was the late nineteenth-century name for Little Burleigh Head - a local reference to Fowler's head bullock, which once went missing and was found there. today, Little Burleigh carries the name 'South Nobby'; the knoll immediately to the south of Mermaid Beach is 'North Nobby' - more recently 'Magic Mountain' - and in Mermaid Beach itself we have Nobby Beach. Never was a team bullock so memorialized!

It was Fowler who first paid heed to the increasing call to a 'house of accommodation' at Burleigh, and it was he, as a local representative on the Divisional Board, who urged allocation of funds for the improvement of the track between Tallebudgera and Burleigh Heads. A local wrote at the time -

By 1882 the Board was clearing the track to 'Meyer's Ferry' - in late 1881 J. H. C. Meyer obtained the lease of a new ferry which allowed wheeled vehicles to cross from Bundall to the present Cavill Avenue in Surfers Paradise. his allowed the many visitors to booming Southport to enjoy brisk buggy and carriage rides along the beach, and for produce from constructing a small 'accommodation house' on land he had purchased from J. Cockerill. this was Section 5 of Allotment 6 in the Town of Burleigh, and Fowlers intention was reported as catering 'for the wants of the district and visitors who assemble in groups and camp in their tents for days... he purposes erecting a commodious house, private at present'. by early 1883, the building was receiving guests. It was apparently prefabricated in Ipswich -

'It contains ten bed rooms, sitting room, dining room &c. It is built a few hundred feet away from the main beach, and is sheltered from the keen wind by a knoll, and being built on piles 11 feet high in the front, has a grand outlook on to the Heads and to the south. Visitors to Southport will then be able to remain and see the scenery around; enjoy the shooting and fishing which is to be had on Tallebudgera Creek.'

'I was shown the bathing grounds in the creek, which is a hard, white sandy beach, and water to any depth that may suit the wishes of the visitor; there will be plenty of milk, vegetables and oysters to be had... Mr. and Mrs. Fowler intend keeping the housed and visitors will find cleanliness and attention paid to their wants; good paddocks provided for horses; conveyances will run to and from Southport.'

Tallebudgera Creek oysters were now being relished in Southport boarding houses and hotels, and an oyster lease on the beds was held by R. Griffiths. Throughout 1882, also, Board work gangs undertook road improvements on the road from Tallebugera to Nerang, in preparation for the running of a daily coach extension from Nerang. this was running by April 1883, bringing even more visitors to Burleigh, as well as those who came by the beach. A local wrote -

'In company with some friends, I paid a visit to Burleigh Heads a few days ago, and can pronounce Fowler's hospitable board a great improvement to eating our lunch beneath the breadfruit trees, as we were compelled to do formerly. Burleigh presented quite a gala appearance, there being two buggies full of pleasure seekers besides a large party of riders...'

This was, indeed, the first substantial building to be erected at Burleigh Heads. Archibald Meston, in many instances a questionable source, recalled in his old age that his brother-in-law, Robert Muir, the prominent Benowa sugar planter, had erected a small one-roomed cottage on Big Burleigh as early as 1871. This may have been the case but it is singularly absent in photographs taken in 1871 and 1880. A small cottage does appear in photographs of the mid-1880s, on land which, significantly, C. W. Cox sold to Muir in January 1885. In any case, the cottage was little more substantial than the demountable humpies in which the timber-getters lived at Burleigh in the early 1860s.

Fowler's at Burleigh was a well-known establishment by the mid-1880s. Queensland's more well-to-do were riding the crest of economic prosperity; Southport was at its height of popularity as the Governor, Sir Anthony Musgrave, established his summer residence there. Regular vehicles running between Southport and Burleigh Heads were first offered in the Christmas season of 1884-85 by R. Griffiths.

J. G. Appell, then a prominent Brisbane solicitor and property investor between Southport and Coolangatta, lunched at Fowler's on his way to Coolangatta in the winter months of 1885 -

'whilst waiting seated on comfortable rocking chairs on the verandah, (we) admire the view seawards. fowler being the boardman for this portion of the division of Nerang, we figuratively roll into him for allowing the township to be neglected as it has been. In his defence he informs us that he had tried his level best to get something done for the place, but that the other members of the board have systematically opposed all his endeavours. In that behalf we then go further into the matter and discover that from the rates and Government endowment, the annual income from Burleigh Government township alone is more than 400 pounds, and not one penny spent on the spot.'

It should be noted, however, that Divisional Board members would over the next twenty years constantly complain that Burleigh landowners themselves had spent very little upon their properties since the first sales in 1872. Indeed in 1888 only four properties appear to have been fenced.

Curiously, Appell was to play a significant part throughout the future Gold Coast by recommending to local and colonial/State governments that lands be reserved for recreational and historic/cultural purposes. In July 1885 he wrote to the Nerang Divisional Board that allotments 4,5,6 and 7 of Section 2, township of Burleigh, be permanently reserved. This was moved at the Board meeting and carried unanimously. In October the Lands Department replied declining to vest the allotments in the council. The Board persisted and ultimately the 'water reserve' which resulted was reclaimed as Rudd Park. Twelve months later the Government reserved Sections 13 and 14 as a 'Reserve for Public Recreation'. This was the bulk of Burleigh Head, which today exists as Burleigh Heads National Park. Henry Schneider, under instruction, had surveyed these sections for sub-division in May 1884.

The Board was hardly extravagant in its expenditure on Burleigh Heads, indeed, with the exception of the occasional few pounds spent on the roads that led there from Tallebudgera and Meyer's Ferry, the extent of expenditure until well into the 1890s appears to have been the erection of a finger sign-post at Reedy Creek 'To Burleigh Heads', funds for which were voted in May 1886.

Tallebudgera was still the focus of attention for the Board, hoping to see it develop as a half-way point between Nerang and Murwillumbah.

In 1886, Fowler decided to lease his premises to a resident licensee and moved for several years to Southport, where he operated a butchery. Washington Waters was the first licensee - a historic figure in the annals of the South Coast, a later Chairman of Nerang Division and Mayor of Southport.

On Saturday morning, 14 April 1887, however, the 'Burleigh Heads Hotel' burnt to the ground -

'The house contained eleven rooms, and was the property of Mr. F. Fowler who had it leased to Mr. W. Waters. It was comparatively a new house, having been erected about two years, and was insured with the South British Company for the sum of 350 pounds. The furniture and stock were insured in the Colonial of New Zealand Insurance Company in the sum of 250 pounds. Only a few chairs and a table were saved. fortunately there was but one lodger in the house at the time and he has sustained no loss. The origin of the five, which broke out in one of the bedrooms is not known, but it is supposed to have been caused by the rats igniting some matches.'

Fowler determined upon recreating the hotel on a grander scale, a project which was no doubt a far more practical proposition than in 1882 as now a sawmill was to be established at Burleigh Heads, near the mouth of Tallebudgtera Creek, close to what is today Elanora Drive. Logs were rafted down Tallebudgera Creek and stored in the swamp which was later reclaimed as Koala Park. It is believed this mill, the most southerly along the Queensland coast at the time, was operating at the site by early 1888.

James William Robinson, a carpenter, obtained the license for Fowler's new two-storey Burleigh Heads Hotel in august 1888. Robinson is reputed to have also been in charge of the hotel's construction -

Robinson held an invitation ball and supper at his new premises on Friday, 23 August, with some 60 visitors coming from as far as Southport and Coomera. Tallebudgera residents were well represented, as he determined to win their trade - already catered for locally by the rose and "Crown and Tobin's Tallebudgera Hotel (opened in 1884) -

'The view in the morning, of the sun rising on the water and the thickly-timbered hills, was one not soon to be forgotten. The house is beautifully situated and comfortably furnished. It contains thirteen bedrooms, three sitting-rooms and a spacious dining-room.'

There was also a four-horse stable, the lack of which J. G. Appell had seen as the major drawback of the previous hotel.

Burleigh Heads was finally achieving the status as a 'sanatorium' which writers in the mid-1870s had predicted. Although not actually experiencing a building boom, a number of allotments changed hands at incr3eased prices in 1887/88; the town of North Burleigh had been surveyed by Joshua Jeays in 1883 and numerous allotments sold in January 1884 after 'spirited bidding', whilst the first store at Burleigh was established in 1888.

This was a building erected originally as a cottage attached to the hotel, on the adjacent Allotment 7 of Section 5 and was probably the house which appears in Bode's painting of the hotel, immediately to the right of the main structure.

In November 1888 the building opened as a store, the 'Burleigh Heads Store', registered in the Nerang Divisional Board valuation records under the ownership of Cottell, Simon and Maynard, sawmill proprietors, of Brisbane. The occupier was S. F. Hunter, who was also manager of the nearby Burleigh Heads Saw Mills -

'The Burleigh Heads Store, which has been established in connection with the sawmills, is now open with a well-selected stock of groceries, hardware, haberdashery, and other goods. The removal of the sawmill to Burleigh and the opening of the store is bound to give an impetus to the advancement of Burleigh, and we have no doubt the proprietors will receive a liberal share of support in their spirited enterprise. The mill is now owned by practical men, who are determined to make it pay, notwithstanding the depression in the timber industry. picnic parties to Burleigh are notified that they can obtain fishing tackle, soft drinks, &c. at the store.'

In the same month, Hunter advertised for tenders for the haulage of sawn timber from the Burleigh Heads Saw Mill to Little Tallebudgera Creek. He also was in charge of the first postal receiving office established in the town, presumably at the store. This opened on 29 August 1888.

The hotel, store and post office became familiar stop-overs for travellers on the new 'Royal Mail Coach' route pioneered by Murwillumbah businessman, Otto Vetter, as of 16 July 1888. A Southport man, John Growns, had previously offered buggy trips to Burleigh Heads, but not on a regular schedule. Vetter's coachline was the first to operate along the beach from Southport to tweed Heads, crossing at Meyer's Ferry and calculating upon low tide, passing around Little Burleigh and fording both Tallebudgera and Currumbin creeks.

Originally a twice-weekly service, by October 1888 Vetter's line operated three times a week; by December it was daily. With the opening of the Brisbane to Southport rail line in January 1889, many travellers to the Tweed preferred this route, linking with river vessels operating from Tweed Heads to Murwillumbah, than endure the hair-raising coach route from Nerang over the border ranges via Tallebudgera. This service was pioneered by Cobb and Company in 1886 and was prone to disruption owing to the state of the roads.

The passage of so many travellers, a more commodious hotel and an active sawmill, meant that a small community developed at the heads. The first major organized sporting event appears to have been the Athletic Sports Day held on the Queen's Birthday, 26 May 1888, featuring stone putting, running high jump, a visitor's handicap, and married men's aces -

'On Wednesday 5 December 1888 there was a 'gala day' at Burleigh Heads in connection with the saw-mill employees. Work was suspended, and the afternoon was spent in games and races of various kinds, the prizes being given by the firm. A sumptuous tea was heartily partaken of, and the evening spent in songs, readings, short speeches and dancing to the merry tunes of old Teddy's fiddle. the manager, Mr. S. F. Hunter, in the course of a felicitous speech, remarked the anxiety of Messrs Simon and Maynard for the happiness and comfort of their workmen, and trusted that kindly dealings on their part would prevent anything in the shape of the too common friction between the employer and employed.'

No doubt this all led to a general prosperity in the district, and yet the Divisional Board continued to devote little in funds to Burleigh, beyond responding to letters of complaint from coach owners such as Vetter as to the state of the roads, with occasional repairs to 'Fowler's Hill',. Indeed, general dissatisfaction over the inadequate dispersal of funds led to a short-lived enthusiasm in 1888 for the secession of Division 3 and its formation as a separate Tallebugera Divisional Board.

This was all fairly quickly forgotten as a new bout of 'railway fever' swept Tallebudera. Trial surveys were underway with three possible routes for a proposed extension of the line from Nerang to the Tweed. What most fired the indignation of valley farmers was the suggestion that the line be a coastal one, missing Tallebudgera altogether. Several well-attended meetings were held throughout 1888, 1889, and 1890, as well as deputations to the Railway Commissioners -

'of what earthly advantage will the fertile land and the rich forests of pine, cedar, beech &c be in the neighbourhood of Tallebudgera if the railway line follows the coast, instead of going through the district where the only traffic that can permanently feed it is to be found.'

The proposed lower coastal route would have passed directly through Burleigh Heads, in fact at Simon's Sawmills. a letter from Washington Waters sums up Tallebudgera farmers' attitude to this proposal -

'To run it by Burleigh would be for the sole purpose of accommodating a few gentlemen and property-owners there, but to run it through an agricultural and thickly-settled district like Tallebudgera would be adding another mainstay to the backbone of the colony. I must say that Burleigh Heads is a pretty place, a nice place for a gentleman's residence and a small seaside resort; but it is not from these seaside resorts that this colony derives its resources - it is from the agricultural and industrial community, and it is that communi8t that ought to be first accommodated as far as railway matters are concerned. The township of Burleigh was sold some eighteen or twenty years ago for two or three pounds an acre, and there are only three of the property owners there that have even spent five shillings upon their property to improve it from that day till this, and some of them, I have every reason to believe, have never seen it. Yet, we hear they are coming forward with the modest impudence to ask the Government to run a railway through there for their accommodation and to increase the value of this two-or-three-pound-an-acre township, leaving the old pioneers, who brought the fertile land of Tallebudgera and Currumbin under the axe and the plough, to cart their produce from four to fourteen miles to this railway.'

Here, summed up, were the origins of a rural attitude to tourist development which would plague local government politics for years to come. The government itself was determined to profit from speculative land sales - to persons without the slightest intention of improving their land for many years to come - hence, another 40 allotments were put u for sale in the Town of North Burleigh at an auction in Brisbane on 28 January 1890. Ten years later, not one block in the township was fenced -

In July 1890 James Robinson transferred the license of the Burleigh Heads Hotel to Miss Theresa Bozier and again gave a lavish party to farewell his friends in the district. Miss Bozier was a relation of Mrs. Frederick Fowler, and came from a family with long experience of inn-keeping at Coomera. She responded in like manner with a ball and supper in May 1891. On this occasion the centre of the dining room ceiling was 'beautifully arranged with staghorns', and some thirty couples waltzed until midnight, retiring to a sumptuous banquet arranged on the balcony.

'now working night and day and is now employing a large number of men, as well as teams. Large rafts of timber, chiefly pine, can now be seen coming down Tallebudgera Creek and as quickly disappear at the mill. Messrs. Hancock Brothers are practical men, every confidence is placed in them to revive the timber industry of this district.'

As with so much else the financial depression and the impact of the 1893 floods in Queensland brought ruin to the sawmilling venture. Only a caretaker is listed in the 1894-95 Queensland post office directory and this was the final entry. The store which was obviously a goods-in kind service for the mail employees, was now operated by Frederick Fowler. the postal receiving office, however, had been transferred to the Hotel in 1889 and was operated from a room off the first floor verandah. It survived, along with the Hotel which underwent several changes of licensee after 1893, when Theresa Bozier left:

There appears to have been no slackening of coach traffic, even in the darkest days of 1893-94 two lines - Clarke and Doherty's and R. W. Dodds - operated daily services to and from Southport and Tweed Heads. Walter R. Clark, who in the early 1890s operated the Tallebudgera Creek oyster leases, eventually entered into silent partnership with Dodds. (He was to marry Emily Gertrude Fowler, Frederick and Elizabeth's only daughter in 1900. Dodds eventually (in 1899) sold out to Thomas Gaven. He in turn entered into a partnership with a Mr. Perkins in early 1900.

'There is a hotel at Burleigh - where we changed horses, and the latest news is parted by our driver to mine host as with deft hands he plies his busy trade behind the bar. Then the cry is 'All aboard!' and crossing the saddle ridge behind the promontory we find ourselves on the bank of Tallebudgera Creek. As the tide has ebbed considerably, and the water at the ford does not reach the top of the wheels, box-seat passengers are allowed to retain their seats, while the inside passengers have recourse to the ferry boat.'

'Shortly after we leave the ferry (MEYERS) the wall runs down on to the beach, and from here to Burleigh we career along the beach, which is so hard that the wheels barely leave a track. The huge rollers chase one another to the shore, the spindrift, from their snowy crests hanging like a gauzy veil above them. Then for half-a-mile the roar of the sea and the rhythmic hoofbeats mingle, white from far off the wall of some seabird strikes the ear.... So we reach the Burleigh Heads Hotel, where we change horses and meet the upward-bound coach. the drivers exchange information about the roads over which each has just passed and avail themselves of it accordingly as is the manner of coachdrivers all over this continent. Over the hard road and down the hill to Tullebudgera Creek, the water in parts being over the axle of the coach. The coachmen know the spot to cross, but woe-betide the novice who essays to cross; and all because the Divisional Board cannot see their way to spend a couple of pounds in putting up a few guide posts.'

'"So ho! my boys", our Jehu whips up his team, who take quite gaily to the firm sand road. Again a foaming billow threatens to envelop us in its seething and whirling waters, the coach almost reaches a standstill, the horses flounder through the backwash, again the waves rush oceanwards, for some fifty or a hundred feet, just as rapidly as they approached, and once more all is well..... As no coach road route lies between Burleigh Head and the sea, we turn off the beach along a scrub track which brings the wayfarer to the Burleigh Heads Hotel. this proves to be the changing station for the coach line - a well appointed and carefully kept hostelry, the proprietor of which is replete with information regarding the beauty spots and sporting grounds of the surrounding district.... "All aboard" once more, and we pass through the pretty Burleigh woodland, with its picturesque honeysuckle and native grass-trees.... The road now dips into Tallebudgera Creek, which at first glance appears to be a dangerous arm of the sea, with an estimated width of nearly half-a-mile from shore to shore. To attempt to ford this inlet of the ocean seems rash in the first degree, but familiarity has given driver and horses confidence, and the good horses wade comfortably across on a good sandy bottom.'

These grand old days were, however, drawing to an end along with the century. The compromise decision to route the Tweed railway through the 'Oyster Beds' at what was to become Booningba or West Burleigh, suited neither the farmers of Tallebudgera, nor the property investors at Burleigh Heads and North Burleigh, and whilst, as it will be seen, the new century saw a handful of residences constructed as seaside homes, the main source of visitors, the coach lines, of course ceased operation with the opening of the rail line in September 1903.

On 6 November 1901, Frederick Fowler, whose foresight first placed Burleigh on tourist maps of the day, died after a tragic fall at his hotel. apart from the doctor who attended him, the other witness to his final will and testament was Frederick George Walker, whose decision to build a home at Burleigh was to presage a new age of development.

Fowler left all his goods and chattels to his 'dear wife, Elizabeth'. These included 'two bullock wagons, very much out of repair', which no doubt had over many years provided a life line to Harper's Warf for the settlers of the Tallebudgera Valley. He also left a cream separator, typical of those which were revolutionizing farming in the Valley at the turn of the century. The coming of the railway meant that dairying was, henceforth, to become the staple industry of the district.

His widow struggled to keep the hotel operating. As late as April 1904 we read she 'always has a vehicle awaiting the arrival of trains'. However, a hotel had been established in 1901 near the site of the proposed West Burleigh Railway Station, and another, the tunnel, had operated in 1901-02, obviously to cater for the many labourers employed on the railway works. Far fewer people now came to Burleigh itself, and in August 1904 the hotel was dismantled, and the postal receiving office closed.

'Tis the 14 of August, one thousand nine hundred and four,

And Sunday, as lonely I sit by he old Kitchen door,

As I gaze on the ruin quite down in the dumps

Where once was a house there's nothing but stumps,

And in a short time there will be little to tell

Excepting a memory of old Burleigh Hotel...'

The extension of the rail line south from Nerang was not, it appears, accompanied by much enthusiasm on the part of the contemporary commissioner for Railways, R. J. Gay. One gains the impression that he left already in 1900 that the New south Wales government would be unlikely to bridge the gap between the Murwillumbah rail head and that of Tweed Heads -

'I fear that the revenue will fall for short of what will be required to avert a heavy annual loss. Even with the completion of this gap the prospects of the line paying are problematical.

Gray could, however, see two possible developments, the opening up of potential dairying country along Mudgeeraba, Talledugera, and Currumbin Creeks and the likelihood that -

'Burleigh and Currumbin will most likely become laces of seaside resort, and there should therefore be a fair amount of revenue from passenger traffic to these places, although we have already too many accessible watering places in the Southern Division of the Colony.'

In the first respect he was particularly far-sighted, as the opening of the line in September 1903 saw a new wave of land development in these valleys, with milk and cream being rail-freighted to Brisbane, and in a few years to Kingston. In April 1904 Isles Love and Company, auctioneers, offered some 10,000 acres in the Currumbin and Tallebudgera valleys, subdivided into farms of 100 to 550 acres.

The new Tallebudgera railway station at the 'Oyster Beds', renamed 'Booningba' in September 1904, was to become a comparatively busy rail centre for the growing rural community in the Upper Tallebudgera, whilst train-loads of holiday excursionists from Brisbane passed on to Tweed Heads and the infant resort of Coolangatta. In one day, 24 October 1903, some 1000 visitors arrived by 'cheap excursion' at Tweed Heads. Very few bothered to visit Burleigh Heads.

W. H. Johnson, proprietor of the Oyster Beds Hotel at 'Booningba' (immediately adjacent to the railway station), advertised the 'abundant fishing shooting and boating' of the locality, which was 'only half an hour's pull to Burleigh Heads'. Few tourists would take the time, go to the expense, or suffer the discomfort of such a 'pull'. Moreover, after the closure of Mrs. Fowler's Burleigh Heads Hotel in 1904, there was no accommodation or store at Burleigh, whilst Tweed Heads was well served in all these respects.

The Nerang Shire council approached the Minister for Railways in March 1904 with respect to the cutting down of the 'Big Hill' between the Oyster Beds and Burleigh, only to have their application rejected. Ironically this stretch of road would still be called the 'Missing Link' in 1950!

One far-sighted individual, Frederick George Walker, a prominent Coomera Valley farmer, decided in 1901 to build a seaside residence overlooking the beach and ocean at Burleigh Heads. apart from this one substantial house, there was little else -

'Taking the beach then for preference, the road turns off it just under Mount Burleigh, and lands one in the very centre of the town of Burleigh, or rather the township site, for the visitor will look in vain for any indication of a settlement ... the only visible sign of life being a few cows grazing.'

Railway passenger figures to Booningba in the first ten years of the line's existence show very little increase:

1 July 1903-30 June 1904	1492
1 July 1904-30 June 1905	1878
1 July 1905-30 June 1906	2373
1 July 1906-30 June 1907	3028
1 July 1907-30 June 1908	3299
1 July 1908-30 June 1909	3124
1 July 1909-30 June 1910	3780
1 July 1910-30 June 1911	3852
1 July 1911-30 June 1912	3640

Presumably a fair number of visitors to Burleigh still travelled along the beach from Southport and several district families, from Tallebudgera, Mudgeeraba and Nerang would visit for picnics or for Easter and Christmas camps. Only gradually did a few Brisbane visitors patch canvas at Burleigh, generally those who preferred to void the crowd and the hustle at Tweed Heads and who were prepared to bring all their supplies with them.

An indication of the growing numb err of campers came with the financing of a public well at Burleigh Heads by the Nerang Shire council in December 1906, and growing complaints over the next two Christmas seasons regarding the state of the fresh water supply and the number of broken bottles littering the town. The most vocal of the handful of new residents was Herbert Goodson, who acquired a number of properties and constantly wrote to the council requesting town and road improvements. Another voice was that of James Herbert, storekeeper at Booningba since 1907 and the first businessman to take advantage of the growing number of campers -

'Everywhere one turns at Burleigh he is charmed with the natural beauties, unimproved by the hand of man. what the place will be when it comes under the control of 'Yankee Australians', one cannot surmise!

'And such is Burleigh! Left as a wilderness for years! Queenslanders never seem for one moment to possess that character of thinking their country is the best in the world. When will they awake to its vast possibilities?'

Such 'booming' did not go unheeded; already in 1907 Edgar Stephens (of Darlington via Beaudesert), and in 1908 William Brake, shirt manufacturer of South Brisbane, had begun to act as true 'Yankee Australians', buying up tracts of properties, many of which had not changed hands since the first land sales in 1872. they were very aware of the potential of the place; men of vision who understood the new 'surfing' vogue which would see open surf beaches suddenly come into vogue in less than five years. They may also have been dimly aware of the possibilities of the 'horseless carriage' which in twenty years would change the fate of Burleigh entirely. Oddly enough, a De Dion Bouton car passed through Tallebudgera on its way to Brisbane in October 1905, having been driven all the way from Sydney.

The best ally for such investors, as well as for most of the residents of the south Coast was, once again, J. G. Apell, who as a prominent landowner throughout the district had been elected as a member of the No. 1 Division of the Nerang Shire council in July 1904. In February 1908 he tendered his resignation owing to his election to Parliament as the Member for Albert and in October of that year the Council lost no time in forwarding their congratulations to their old friend who had now been appoint4ed to the influential position of Minister of Works and ;Mines. the next year he became the Home Secretary, and as such he received continuous appeals for the attention of government from the residents and ratepayers of the Burleigh Heads district, where, of course, he held land himself.

Progress Associations were now the vogue: one was established at Tallebudgera in 1906; even Booningba acquired one of 1910; requesting the Council approach the Home Secretary to use his influence to obtain a station master there, and for attention to be paid to the road over the Big Hill. The road was so difficult in places that a number of visitors were rowed down Tallebudgera Creek from Big Burleigh. One such visitor reminisced of a visit in 1910 -

'There (Boongba) we picked up stores, including meat, which had been sent up from Tweed Heads. We then embarked on a rowing boat with a local lad and pulled about two miles down the Creek to Big Burleigh. then we carried our goods across the saddle behind Big Burleigh along a bush track to a small cottage on a rise not far from the beach.

'There were two or three of these little places owned, I believe by a local farmer, who let them to visiting fishing parties. The farmer's son brought us milk and eggs each day, cut wood etc.'

Herbert Goodson, one local resident and property owner concerned with the welfare of the increasing number of visitors, wrote to the Nerang Shire Council in January 1911 with reference to -

It should be stated that a Tweed Heads Surf Life Saving Club had been formed as early as 1909, and that surf bathers were preferring to swim where such equipment was available.

Goodson again wrote in April 1911 complaining of the lack of storage facilities for the life line purchased by public subscription, of which he was in charge, and stating 'that under present conditions, part being kept in Mr. Brake's bathing house, and part at his residence, that it would not be readily available if needed'. This is, significantly, the first reference to a private beach bathing house at Burleigh Heads. They would proliferate and become an eyesore until their final removalin1937.

The shed for housing the lifeline was finally erected in lat4e 1912 for the Council by George Chippendale, after Goodson wrote that the tent in which he had been obliged to store the equipment had been destroyed.

The other need was sanitation. Incredibly the first call for 'public closets' at Burleigh Heads came only in December 1911. They were eventually constructed, again by George Chippendale, in late 1912 by which time the Shire Council had determined upon a permit scheme for the erection of tents 'on any road, recreation ground, foreshore or any other land under the control of the Council'. for any tent 'not exceeding 48 square feet' the fee was 2/6 (25 cents) per week, or part thereof. If the Council could capitalize upon the increasing number of visitors, so presumably could the property developers.

The first important estate subdivision sales occurred in 1911 and 1912, auctioned by Isles Love on behalf of F. Wilson, who had acquired acres as a speculation in 1901. The Brake family - William, his wife Elizabeth, and sons Walter James Brake and North Brake - acquired further property in 1912, at Little Burleigh, and in 1913 their interest in the future of the district led to the election of W. J. Brake as a councillor for the new No. 4 Division of the Nerang Shire Council. by February 1916 he was Deputy Shire Chairman and, in 1917, Chairman. Within a few months of his election, Brake had successfully urged the Council to reduce the camping fee per tent to 1 shilling (10 cents) per week, recording that 'they were prepared to do the best to encourage people to come to Burleigh'. This was the Council's first definite statement of any encouragement of tourist development at Burleigh possibly influenced by the fact that Coolangatta's successful appeal for separation from Nerang Shire was due to come into effect in 1914.

The most crying need at Burleigh was now some form of accommodation to attract visitors other than campers. In January 1913, William Henry Stephens acquired Allotments 12 and 13 of Section 5, Town of Burleigh, upon which he constructed a large boarding house with views over the beach and ocean. He named it 'The Bluff Residential Hotel' and guests were received for the 1913-14 Christmas season. In 1914 a trunk telephone line from Booningba which Councillor Brake successfully urged be renamed 'West Burleigh' in September 1914:

The Council finally, in 1914, voted for work to be undertaken on the Bill Hill between West Burleigh and Burleigh Heads, although 590 pounds went very little in the way of making this short distance trafficable.

Further successful estate sales took place. A Government land sale of 56 allotments, I rood each, took place on 12 January 1915. The first large Brake family estate - 'the Burleigh Heads Township Estate, comprising 36 blocks high and breezy and looking right out to sea', were auctioned by Isles Love on 3 April 1915. The population slowly grew, and photographs show a gradual sprinkling of cottages and the occasional larger home.

Services also gradually developed: Charles and Arthur Justins, whose family had for several years enjoyed camping holidays at Burleigh, operated a temporary store for visitors at Easter and Christmas after 1913. As mentioned, a post office opened in 1914 after ten years of closure, and in 1915 W. Pearce opened the first permanent store. Mrs. M. Black moved from Nerang in 1915 with her family and opened the second boarding house in the town. By the time of her death in 1942 she had become a beloved Burleigh pioneer, known to all as 'Gran'.

The Council now called for tenders for the construction of public bathing boxes at Burleigh beach, to be completed for the Christmas season of 1915-16. W. Fradgley, of Brisbane, was one who tendered for this contract. Also, a man was appointed to collect camping fees at the beach, and the first woman sanitary reserve was proclaimed. The Automobile also began to appear. ?The occasional intrepid motorist negotiated the bumpy tracks that went by name of roads from Nerang through Mudgeerabga. Reedy Creek to Burleigh and others attempted the journey along the beach, a straight unbroken stretch between Main Beach and North Burleigh. A meeting of the Brisbane Chamber of Commerce in late 1915 discussed the need for a better motor route to the Tweed and before the end of that year the Automobile Club took up the cause, offering 'warning signs for dangerous places.', three of which were accepted by Councillor Brake for Division 4.

The growing population of the district also led to calls for a school, initially at 'Burleigh West' where, no doubt, there were more children who would have been obliged to travel to influence to obtain a State School at 'Burleigh West'. A school building was subsequently erected at a cost of 387 pounds 11 shillings 'about a mile from the township' on 19 March 1917, with Guy Workman, as teacher; within a few months he was replaced by a local, Jessie M. Andrews. the enrolment in December 1917 was 14 boys and 8 girls. Miss Andrews remained as teacher until 1922 when Mr. F. W. Perrett took over the position.

Environmental issues only began to figure as the tourist potential of Burleigh Head dawned upon the local Shire Council and residents. Herbert Goodson had complained of broken glass left b visitors as early as 1906, however, with no sanitary facilities until 1912, and no increase in the number of earth closets until 1920, the state of camping grounds is best left to the imagination, with only a rudimentary rubbish and night soil collection being provided during the height of the season. Nor was there apparently any control for a number of years over where campers pitched tents. In 1913 J. G. Appell, who had for over thirty years taken an interest in the history of the Coast, located the Kombumerri bora ring at North Burleigh, at a time when increasing traffic, land subdivision and camping threatened the site -

'It was a typical bora ground, although it had deteriorated. The main traffic passed over the western bank, and the ground had become overgrown with plants, still on the southern, eastern and northern portions of the circle it was in fairly good condition.'

Appell approached the Nerang Shire Council, who supported the gazettal of a reserve, which was in force by December. A simple two-rail fence was the only protection for this important cultural site for many years, indeed no sign informed visitors of the reserves significance until 1932.

Local residents were complaining as early as 1913 regarding the wholesale clearance of foreshore vegetation prior to land sale and even on the Big Burleigh Reserve, there were reports of unlicensed removal of timber and vandalism. The latter was not new, as a visitor to Big Burleigh in 1908 commented on -

In 1916, however, attitudes were changing. In July of that year, the Shire Council received plans from the Commissioner for Lands, proposing to resurvey Sections 13 and 14,the bulk of the 1886 Big Burleigh Reserve into 20 perch allotments. Councillor Brake remarked that this was -

Strong protests were forwarded to the Government in July and September 1916, the plans for subdivision were shelved and the reserve was placed under the care of the Nerang Shire Council as trustees in 1918. It would be almost fifteen years before any practical work was undertaken to improve the 'goal track' which had existed since the 1860s around a small part of Big Burleigh; and as late as 1923 the District Land Office was seeking the cooperati8on of the council to prevent further removal of timber from the reserve.

Another environmental issue was the oyster beds along Tallebudgera Creek, most of which had been reserved under lease since the last century. As early as 1906 the shire council had attempted to acquire control of at least part of the oyster banks which were a popular tourist feature. They were advised by the Marine Board that the 'north foreshore of the Bluff at the mouth of the creek' was to be retained as 'unlicensed ground which the public could use as a recreation ground for bathing, fishing &c'. As for the better oyster grounds to visitors by 1910, had erected warning notices and even ordered people off. A good feed of oysters was still available before 1920 to those who were willing to consume oysters on the spot, which they were legally entitled to do, from the leases as well as from the public areas closer to the creek mouth. Obviously an explosion of visitor numbers quickly affected the oyster beds over the next twenty years.

In 1917 a writer for the weekly Queenslander reported that Burleigh Heads was becoming 'one of the most popular seaside resorts' on the South Coast line, putting particular emphasis upon its safe surf bathing -

'During the recent Christmas and New Year holidays over six hundred tent-dwellers of both sexes, and ranging in age from infancy to the centenarian, were camped on the reserve on the foreshores of the main ocean beach...

'Since the writer's previous visit, some twelve months ago, this seaside township has made vast headway, many of our city business folk having erected cottages, in which they may spend their week-ends and holidays.'

A good number of 'furnished cottages' had also been erected as speculations, e.g. in 1917 the Brake family offered cottages 'all good positions, boat with each' for 15 shillings (81.50), 20 shillings (82), and 30 shillings ($3.00) per week. Charles Justins, of Melbourne Street, South Brisbane offered cottages, as well as tents and boats for hire.

*1893*	*William Velong*
*1894*	*John McLeod (December 1893-April 1894)*
*1895*	*Owen G. Dodds (April 1894-April 1895)*
*1898*	*Elizabeth Fowler (until 1904)*

1 July 1912-30 June 1913	3677
1 July 1913-30 June 1914	4110
1 July 1914-30 June 1915	4314
1 July 1915-30 June 1916	5254
1 July 1916-30 June 1917	6466